Understanding FrameMaker’s maker.ini file

The maker.ini file is a simple text file with configuration settings which FrameMaker checks at every launch. There are at least two maker.ini files: in the installed location as well as in the User Account Preferences. You can edit either based upon your requirements.

At User Account

Before you start

Being a text file in true nature, you can open and edit it on any text editor.

Before you change anything in the file:

Keep a back-up of the maker.ini file, in case, you want to revert back to original state.

Ensure you have administrator privileges to modify the file.

Ensure FrameMaker is not running while editing the maker.ini.

One first glance you would notice that the maker.ini itself has several sections, each governing a specific feature in FrameMaker. You can notice entries that are commented starting with semi-colon (;). Most of the entries can be customized and modified by toggling their values between on/off. Let’s understand and try to edit them to see the impact.

Sample Customizations

1) FrameMaker

ProductInterface=Structured FrameMaker It is always stored in user account mode location of maker.ini. It controls UI for FrameMaker as structured or unstructured.

Language=English Used for UI and dictionary language and is based on Installation Language for the product.

2) Preferences

AskExit=On Prompts a dialog on Closing FrameMaker.

BackupOnSave=On Creates project backup and updates it on every save.

AutoSave=Off 5 Automatically saves the opened book/document, periodically at the specified time interval.

3) Alert Prompts

MissingGraphicsDialog=On Documents contains missing graphics.

UnresolvedCrossReferencesDialog=On Prompts for Unresolved Cross References because of marker for source is deleted/modified/moved/being used by someone.

OpeningOldReleaseDocDialog=On For FrameMaker source file created in previous version of product.

UnavailableFontsDialog=On Prompts for unavailable fonts on machine w.r.t. fonts used in the FrameMaker source file.

4) Auto Spell Check

EnableAutoSpellCheck=On By default checks for spelling for inserted text and prompts for corrections.

5) Thermometers

The above values modify the color for FrameMaker printing progress dialog box, which shows pink (by default). You can change the color for completed and remaining slides.

I have customized the value to change the color from Pink to Purple:

Changed thermometer color

NOTES

FrameMaker reads the maker file from installed directory.

If you want to make changes globally for all users using FrameMaker on a particular machine, modify the installed directory maker.ini, but if you want to restrict changes to a specific user only, then you should make those changes in maker.ini file only for that user account.

Working with customized FDK plug-ins and interface also requires an entry to be substituted for the custom panel/window inside the maker.ini.

Nandini Gupta is a Senior Content and Community Manager planning and delivering documentation for a wide range of Adobe products, including Creative Cloud, Photoshop, Lightroom, Elements, and FrameMaker. The web and its many forms of communication fascinate her. Whether it is technology, communication, or life, her vote is for a simple magical experience.

7 thoughts to “Understanding FrameMaker’s maker.ini file”

Anyone out there who can tell how to change the UI Language (FM 2017) from Language=USEnglish to =German. It does not seem to be enough just to change the maker.ini. There’s no option in the tool preferences either. Cheers!

Should the two versions of the ini file be identical? The one in my user account is much shorter than the one in my installed location. We are having some issues with FM, and I wonder if it has to do with the two different versions of the ini file?

Your welcome Markus! We currently do not have all values documented, but I most of the invisible values are self explanatory by the name, if you observe closely by setting their value between on/off they should yield your expected result on Next FrameMaker launch.

thanks for providing that link. I didn’t talk about the values, I talked of possible settings, that are not available in the installed ini file, like HyphanateNonRomanFonts. This setting is available since FM10 and it is necessary if you are using global fonts like Arial Unicode MS or FM’s combined fonts. So it’s a very important feature for some customers. Nobody knows about this feature (and perhaps others) because it’s not documented and not available in the maker.ini by default. So please make all of these invisible features visible in some way at least in the maker.ini file and better in your documentation.